Need more caregivers? Help family caregivers join our industry.
There are simply not enough professional caregivers to meet the demand today. We’re facing a shortfall of about 355,000 caregivers in the not too distant future. Because of this shortage, senior care businesses today must try to bring new entrants into the field. Family caregivers who have the right heart and aptitude for the work, but don’t yet have the training, licensure and familiarity to the professional duties of the work.
While for some senior care businesses, this may sound like more work for you (and it may be), it has also ended up being a lot of work for your new potential caregiver, too. Let me explain….
When a family caregiver is applying for their first professional caregiving position, they will likely be unfamiliar with:
Your state license/registration requirements (IE California Home Care Aide ID / TB test)
Your state background check and drug screen requirements
How scheduling works in this industry (you may have multiple clients and drive between them)
What the relationship is between the employer, caregiver and family of the older adult receiving care. (IE, scheduling always goes through the employer, they won’t know what issues should be relayed to their manager versus the family and what that communication workflow is like)
They likely have not have received any proper training on the tasks and daily responsibilities of a professional caregiver
Long story short: family caregivers making the transition to professional care have a lot they will be learning. And, that can be overwhelming and a big barrier to entry, especially for the typical caregiver wage.
For some of our clients at Augusta.care, we’re phone screening their applicants and scheduling in-person interviews. Through this process and the aforementioned realities about transitioning from family caregiving to professional caregiving, we’re finding that for some people the barrier to entry to a senior care business is simply too high. But, there are 53 Million family caregivers out there, so that is a talent pool that cannot be ignored.
So, we have a suggestion for the senior care operators out there: prepare yourselves to streamline your hiring process the same way you do for an intake of a new client.
What do you do when you get an inbound lead of a client? Follow up immediately, get them on the phone, a zoom or in-person meeting with the family as soon as humanly possible. Make it easy for your client to understand your business, how you can help. You spend a lot of time understanding why they’re there and what they’re worried about so you can make sure your value proposition, budget, timeline, scope of work all align with their specific needs. You may even customize your service offering a bit so that you can accommodate their needs. You put a ton of effort into making it an easy and useful process for your potential new client, right?
The same needs to be done for your hiring process. It needs to be an easy, insightful process that helps you build a trusted relationship with your potential caregiver. Here are some of our learnings on how to make it an experience that optimizes your ability to tap into a new pool of caregivers:
Differentiate your business to Caregiver applicants by being a partner to them. Don’t be a gatekeeper to new industry entrants.
Some home care agencies reject applicants without considering them at all if they don’t have a state registration or license number, or haven’t completed state required training or health test.
You will stand out from the crowd if you interview all reasonable candidates for your positions. Can you reimburse them for getting their registration or license (IE California HCA ID number) once they’ve started working for you? Can you guide them through the HCA process, rather than telling them to go get it before you talk?
Consider how easy it is to go through your application process. Try to go through it yourself.
Do your job postings describe the work in the same way that a family caregiver would describe it? Or, are your job postings filled with jargon that make it difficult for the applicant to believe they’re qualified?
Many people don’t apply for a job where they don’t think they meet ALL the hiring criteria. So, you’re losing potentially good applicants who aren’t even applying if the hiring criteria are too lengthy or jargony.
Are you requiring them to learn about your state training or licensure requirements before a phone screen?
Your state’s licensing requirements (such as the California Home Care Aide ID registration) likely feel complicated to your family caregiver making the transition to professional caregiving.
Advertise that you can help them get licensed (when necessary) in their state and will walk them through the process. Even better if you can help them pay for it. But, make sure you advertise that support either way.
Do your caregivers need to fill out an application with 60+ questions before they’re phone-screened? Or, can you have the caregiver fill out a detailed application with their references and complete work history once they’re in the office?
Successful recruiters are streamlining the hiring process to flow seamlessly into their onboarding process.
After the phone screen, try transition immediately into an in-person interview/onboarding process. At the in-person interview, have them complete the full application, and help them register for any state requirements and what they need to do next for background checks or health test requirements.
Before the candidate leaves any meeting, make sure your next event with them is already scheduled. That next meeting could be training or may be a follow up to collect the results of the health tests or background check. They shouldn’t leave your office without knowing when and where you’ll meet again.
Get the applicant on a screening call as soon as possible and move them through the hiring process as quickly as you can.
If more than a couple days go by after their phone screen, before the next step in the hiring process, the chances are low you will hire them. In this way, family caregivers are just like any other applicant, they’re looking for other job opportunities, so time is of the essence.
Combine parts of the process wherever you can so it’s as few steps as possible.
If you’re waiting for state registration to be processed (IE CA HCA ID), are you touching base with them every couple days until it comes through? That is another period of time where there can be candidates dropping off. Remind them of any benefits around this, such as reimbursement for the HCA and TB cost once they’ve completed it or after working some number of shifts.
Need help reaching a new pool of talented caregivers to apply to your jobs? Contact us at Augusta.care today!
